Hard Times, Overcoming (2020)

Scored for Clarinet, Violin, Viola, and ‘Cello; challenging, about 4:55. $15 for score, parts, demo; order here. The 2020 stories of the deadly Covid-19 virus and the outpouring of frustration, rage, and calls to action stemming from the spate of tragic killings of African-Americans at the hands of police are now thoroughly entwined.  An unblinking, passionate, and long overdue discussion of ingrained racism in America is taking place in the midst of a dangerous pandemic, with earnest demonstrators of every persuasion and ethnicity risking their health to emphasize the difficult truth that drastic change – in our hearts as well as our institutions – is absolutely necessary. In this piece I have coupled these co-mingled crises with two venerable, quintessentially American tunes that still speak to us in today’s context.  To represent the relentless threats of economic struggle, malign politicians, environmental doom, and now a pandemic, I have employed Stephen Collins Foster’s classic lament for the poor, Hard Times, Come Again No More.  For the peaceful, yet determined struggle for racial equity I quote the essential anthem of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, We Shall Overcome. The two melodies are quoted sporadically in altered and fragmented motives, often just below the level of conscious recognition.  They gradually become somewhat more obvious as the piece progresses – analogous to the way in which the frustration with the status quo and the determination to fix it have been on the increase.  There are sections of quiet restlessness and others in which it boils over into angry chaos; both of these are suitably underpinned with suggestions of a blues chord progression.  There are also sections of quiet introspection, and as this is all about very stressed human beings, one mood can give way very quickly to another, sometimes in reaction to a provocation.  Near the end, the last phrase of Hard Times is presented in a hymn-like manner; in the last 8 bars, in the violin, the final phrase of We Shall Overcome is sounded with its last note included for the first time. It ends in a mood of quiet acknowledgement that there is much hard work yet to be done.